Last week, Deep Rock Galactic’s next big spin-off game launched on Steam. Unlike Deep Rock Galactic: Survivor, an excellent Vampire Survivors-like, this new game, Deep Rock Galactic: Rogue Core, is more like the original sci-fi mining game. The big difference is that Rogue Core is a harder, faster, and more action-packed shooter spin on the original. And while what’s here is fun with a buddy, the game needs some tweaking to make it a bit less of a pain.
Deep Rock Galactic: Rogue Core, like the other games in the franchise, stars space-faring dwarves obsessed with drinking, dancing, and mining. This time around, you play as a more elite badass dwarf known as a Reclaimer. They are sent into mining operations that are overrun with too many nasty critters and strange alien monsters. Each time you hop into a mission in Rogue Core, you’re entering a procedurally generated mining facility that has fallen to the enemy. So each run is different, but y’know, also always filled with monsters trying to kill you and any friends you’ve brought along. Each of these missions has elevators to activate, taking you deeper into the core until you reach a boss.
I’ve not reached the end yet because Rogue Core can be brutal.
When playing with friends, Rogue Core is more manageable. More guns, more bullets. But even playing with friends introduces some problems, the biggest being that when you level up by mining and collecting enough green experience rocks, your group gets to pick a new bonus, ability, or weapon. But you do so in a random order, meaning you can take stuff other people might want, or be stuck with something you don’t. Other parts of the game work like this, too, and many players on Steam seem down on it. And I get it. When playing with randos, it can be annoying that people just take the best thing regardless of what makes sense at that moment.
But on the other hand, playing Rogue Core with my brother was a blast because we would work together…until one of us got greedy and grabbed a really good perk or weapon right in front of the other one while cackling. The devs seem to be figuring out a way to make this part of the game less mean, which I get. But I hope when playing with friends, I’ll still be able to choose to keep this type of upgrade selection, as it’s too much fun to hear your friend or brother yell at you after you grab the rare damage upgrade they wanted.
I do get why the change might happen, though, as playing Rogue Core alone can be a nightmare. The game floods the world with enemies, and with all of them chasing and attacking you at once, it can lead to a lot of game overs. I’d go as far as to say that, at the moment, Rogue Core isn’t really a game I’d recommend to people unless you have one buddy willing to play with you. Or you don’t mind dealing with greedy randos.
More bullets, please
Of course, this is probably why so many runs have ended in disaster for my squad and me. Rogue Core demands a lot of teamwork and efficiency. You need to be moving, upgrading, and mining constantly. And even then, runs can still end in failure because of bad luck. Not helping matters is how stingy the game is with ammo, something the devs are also looking to tweak in future updates. That would be very helpful; at least a few of my runs likely would have gone a lot better if I’d had a few more bullets on hand.
Even when I’m getting my ass kicked, though, I’m still having a good time with Rogue Core. The gunplay is very responsive, mining through spaces adds a lot of options, and between missions, there’s a fun ship to explore where you and your friends can drink, lift weights, or just dance the night away. There are also permanent upgrades to unlock, which will help make your space miner a bit more sturdy and deadly over time, hopefully making it easier to finally reach the bottom of a mining operation.
If Rogue Core‘s ammo issues can be fixed and a solution is implemented to make it so greedy players can’t derail every random matchmade mission, this could end up being a really great co-op roguelike shooter. The devs do seem committed to a big roadmap of tweaks and new content, so that’s promising. The game is in early access, so I hope these pain points are fixed over time. At the moment, though, it’s just a good but flawed experience that I’d never play solo, but will happily play again with a friend or two.
